1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a backup method of applications of portable cellular phones and more particularly to the backup method capable of preventing illegal copying of the applications of the portable cellular phones.
The present application claims priority of Japanese Patent Application No. 2000-374624 filed on Dec. 8, 2000, which is hereby incorporated by reference.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years a market for portable cellular phones is expanding with increasing speed. Ordinarily, such the portable cellular phones are being sold with necessary applications incorporated internally by a manufacturer of the portable cellular phones. Since types of the portable cellular phones are changed frequently in recent years, as in a case of computers, service of distributing applications of such the portable cellular phones is going to be started.
However, when the application is distributed to each of the portable cellular phones, the application can be copied. Therefore, it presents a problem as to how a copyright on software for the application can be secured. A Java (copyright: Sun Micro Systems Inc.) application, in particular, is downloaded from the Internet so as to be installed on the portable cellular phone, as a result, there is a danger that the application is copied illegally by a person not being an owner (that is, a legal user or an authorized user) of the portable cellular phone.
Moreover, in some cases, a telephone number or applications of the portable cellular phone are lost due to operational error. In such a case, it can be thought that the application can be stored as its backup copy in, for example, a personal computer or a like, however, in this case, there is a danger that the application is copied illegally by persons other than the owner (the legal user or the authorized user) of the portable cellar phone. Accordingly, how the illegal copying of the application can be prevented is become a problem.